I love you, but by no means am I in love with you. Wednesday with Crystal Stilts and He Say She Say.

[All photos in this post by Hatnim Lee]

A dip into the Fader Fort for Crystal Stilts, a secondary (to their friends Chairlift's primary) draw for the night . Notice how the buzz bands are placed squarely around the “Levi's Happy Hour” every night? These Fader guys have marketing down to a skinny-T.

While I should have seen these Crystal Stilts characters playing in my sleep at this point, they being a Brooklyn band of the hour even prior to the Vivian Girl's own recent moment in the ecstatic media sun, this was my first time. That crime aside, any passing comparison to the V. Girls is actually lost in a live setting. While their records share a deep, some might say rhapsodic affection for that ol' wall of sound blocking so many an earnest listener's ear from the sorcerers behind the gate, the armaments of reverb, at least within the carefully cultured confines of the Fader Fort, sounded surprisingly clean… differentiated notes, chipper hi-hats, spunky organ hooks; these guys were much readier to be a big name pop band than I knew.

He Say, She Say played next, proudly announcing their allegiance to Lupe Fiasco (they're on his label, they named themselves after a 2007 single by the Chicago MC), before launching into cutesy hip pop. They're what you expect from the name: a singing female vocalist, and a guy with a midi keyboard and a laptop cuing and bouncing around. It was cute, sachharine, and probably better on headphones. I kept waiting for their front woman to pull the mic from the stand and pull a CMJ Santogold 2007, grabbing us gawking audience members by the throat.

No avail, for now.